1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a probe for diagnosing otitis media using terahertz electromagnetic waves, and system and method for diagnosing otitis media using the same, which can diagnose occurrence, kinds, progression, and state of otitis media using terahertz electromagnetic waves.
2. Background of the Related Art
Otitis media is inflammation of the tympanic cavity, occurs at a wide age group, from infants to adults, and is a common disease that about 30 percent of infants under the age of three have at least three times. According to clinical signs, otitis media is divided into acute otitis media and exudative otitis media, and is classified into chronic otitis media when otitis media symptoms are continued longer than three months.
Symptoms of acute otitis media are earache, fever, flare of the eardrum, expansion, impaired motility, and suppurative secretion. Moreover, because acute otitis media frequently recurs, a patient must be medicated antibiotics for several months while observing improvement of the symptoms. On the contrary, exudative otitis media has an exudation in the tympanic cavity without any symptoms of acute infections, such as earache, fever or others, and hence, is treated by different methods without medication of antibiotics differently from acute otitis media. Therefore, acute otitis media and exudative otitis media must be exactly divided and treated by curing methods that are right for the symptoms. Furthermore, it is important to correctly diagnose because otitis media frequently recurs and causes serious complications if the treatment is failed, but the doctor cannot provide correct and safe diagnosis and it is very difficult to correctly diagnose because otitis media occurs at the back of the eardrum.
As methods for diagnosing otitis media, there are a direct clinical examination method (otoscopy), a diagnostic suspicion of otitis media through an opinion on the eardrum, a hearing test using an impedance audiometer for generating a sound to measure an echo sound, and a method for directly perforating the eardrum using a syringe to examine the eardrum.
However, the direct examination has a great possibility of misdiagnosis of acute otitis media and exudative otitis media, and hence, it may cause complications due to abuse of antibiotics and inappropriate treatment. The hearing test using the impedance audiometer is complicated in measurement and causes many errors according to patients' age or gender. Additionally, the method for directly perforating the eardrum may cause side effects due to perforation and causes an intense pain, and cannot be applied to infants who occupy most of the patients having a middle ear infection.
Korean Patent Laid-open No. 10-2010-130,765 discloses a probe for diagnosing exudative otitis media, which can diagnose occurrence of exudative otitis media using the characteristic that there are different forms of reflected waves of ultrasonic waves according to whether or not there is any exudation which is higher in viscosity than a carrier after injecting the carrier, such as distilled water, into the external auditory meatus. However, the conventional diagnosis probe has a disadvantage in that it is difficult to give a right prescription to the patient because it is difficult to diagnose suppurative otitis media or acute otitis media and to grasp progression of the disease. Moreover, the conventional diagnosis probe has further disadvantages in that it is difficult to diagnosis the disease at the early stage in the case that reflected waves of ultrasonic waves are used, and in that it is difficult to remove the carrier after diagnosis due to the viscosity of the carrier injected into the external auditory meatus.